


Unwise Career Choices

by depizan



Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic
Genre: Action/Adventure, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-03
Updated: 2016-07-03
Packaged: 2018-07-19 18:39:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7373083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/depizan/pseuds/depizan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ficlets from the career of Kyrian, an Imperial Agent who isn't entirely suited to his line of work. Unless one is supposed to leave a trail of live people across the galaxy.</p>
<p>(Covers the beginning of his career until somewhere between "The Enemy of My Enemy Is...?" and "Conflicts of Interest")</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Question of Success

**Author's Note:**

> Everyone's story must start somewhere. Kyrian's begins while he's a trainee. (Whatever exactly Imperial Intelligence training entails.)

Had he been wrong? Should he have obeyed orders, followed the scenario to the letter, trusted in the fail-safes of the training exercise? Intelligence training _was_ dangerous. People did die, though not often. And they did get injured.

_Obviously._ Kyrian’s face throbbed at the reminder, a nasty counterpoint to his other aches.

He stared out across the jungle below. Climbing onto the barracks roof had hurt, but there were few places in the training base where one could get privacy, and none of the others were outside. The air was misty, but for once it wasn’t actually raining. His uniform was – limitedly – waterproof, anyway. It had to be on Dromund Kaas.

_I didn’t put anyone else at risk, and I didn’t disregard orders, not really; I just found another way._ And it had worked. Mostly. His injuries weren’t serious, just painful, and he had succeeded. Wasn’t that what mattered? Didn’t Intelligence _want_ creativity?

_Not from trainees._

It was arrogance. He’d acted as if he knew better than the Instructors. If he had a military background, like some of the older trainees, that might have been forgivable. Not from an orphanage recruit who asked too many questions.

What was the point of half their classes if they weren’t supposed to use what they learned? Stealth and persuasion and infiltration. _That wasn’t the point of_ this _exercise._ Practicing straightforward methods, however brutal at times, was just as important.

_But it worked._

If it hadn’t, it would have been the end of his career, before it had even started. That much had been clear. If he screwed up again, he was finished. If his chances of becoming a field agent weren’t finished anyway.

The cut on his face would scar, as would the ones on his arm and shoulder. That was the point – or half the point – of barring him from all but the most basic (and archaic) of medical treatment for them. He could hardly forget the importance of following orders and sticking to the mission as outlined when the results of not doing so stared him in the face every time he looked in a mirror.

The reasoning seemed somewhat over-dramatic for a simple cut. It wasn’t as if he were disfigured, just … marked. _Not ideal in a field agent._

Was that it, then? An unspoken punishment – consigning him to a career at Headquarters, analyzing data and watching other people travel the galaxy on exciting missions. _No._ He shook his head. There was no point in yelling at him about following orders, or about the uncertainty of medical care in the field, if he were going to be reassigned to Fixer training.

He put a hand to his bandaged cheek. He would be the most obedient and diligent trainee. No awkward questions, no unapproved creativity, nothing that would jeopardize his career. Once he was out of training, he could do things his way.

_It did work._ A training exercise wasn’t reality. He knew that. Still, success couldn’t be _entirely_ wrong.


	2. Perfectly Executed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kyrian, newly minted Imperial Agent, lands on Hutta for his first assignment, and finds that nothing is ever simple or easy. Though it might be simpler or easier if he stuck to other people's plans.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for the first Imperial Agent mission on Hutta, "Claim Your New Identity." Though this is rather an alternate version of events.

The guard leaned against the door frame, a cigarra drooping lazily from one corner of his mouth. The lit end glowed brightly in Hutta’s grimy twilight, marking his head as well as any laser sight.

Finding a vantage point on the hill above the shabby building Fa’athra’s thugs had claimed had been easy. Most of the citizens of Jiguuna were eager to avoid getting caught up in the Hutt conflict and conspicuously ignored anyone who wasn’t shooting at them. The last thing they wanted was to see where an off-worlder with a rifle was going.

Kyrian studied the guard through his sights. The man worked for a Hutt. He was probably a terrible person who kicked small animals and stole from children. Certainly he and the others in the building hadn’t hesitated to steal the case of valuables Intelligence had sent to Hutta as a means for Kyrian to – in the person of the Red Blade, notorious pirate – gain an audience with Nem’ro the Hutt. Nor would the guard hesitate to use the blaster on his hip to defend the building and its ill-gotten contents.

Jheeg had insisted that they needed to eliminate the thieves to ensure that no one learned of the theft. There could be no doubts about the Red Blade’s competence. Or Jheeg’s. Keeper seemed like a man who expected missions to run smoothly.

Kyrian wasn’t sure what Intelligence did with contacts who failed them, but he had the uncomfortable feeling that they usually knew too much to leave alive. With Fa’athra’s thieves dead and the case reclaimed, Jheeg could concentrate on proving that the theft was a fluke and that he was still invaluable to Imperial Intelligence.

The cigarra end flared as the guard drew on it. He was a perfect target. He would never even know what hit him.

Buying the case back had been out of the question – making the offer would only alert the thieves to how valuable the contents were _and_ encourage them to brag about the theft. Stealing it back, however…

Kyrian considered the building. It had a back door – unguarded, he’d checked that already – and the lock was mechanical, likely with no defense against the tiny laser cutter built into his wrist chrono. The case wasn’t the only thing the thieves had stolen from the spaceport; they had helped themselves to an entire shuttle’s worth of cargo.

_They’ll sort the cargo, decide what’s worth selling, and what’s worth taking to Fa’athra._ The case was small and nondescript. Whatever else had been on the shuttle had been the target of the theft. If the thieves were distracted, there was a chance he could simply slip in the back door, locate the case, and slip out unnoticed.

Kyrian shouldered his rifle and made his way down the hillside. He couldn’t be seen. The Red Blade was lethal and ruthless, not at all the sort of person who quietly retrieved stolen cases. But if the thieves never even knew they’d _had_ the case, Jheeg had nothing to fear, and the mission could go on as planned.

His comm had a setting that amplified sounds. He pressed it to the back door and listened. He could make out the distant sounds of conversation – too distant to be directly behind the door. Another room, most likely.

He took a deep breath. _I’m sorry, Jheeg._

The lock melted like butter. There was no reaction from inside the building. Kyrian eased the door open and slipped into the darkened room.

Aside from a couple of chairs and a stained carpet, the room was empty. Light spilled in through an open doorway from what looked to be a hall. Voices carried down it from the front of the building, not quite loud enough for Kyrian to make out words.

He edged softly to the doorway and peered down the hall.

It ran down the center of the building, closed doors on either side marking other rooms – hopefully unoccupied. The light and voices came from a large room at the front of the building. The hallway at that end was partially blocked by a large military crate and a couple of bolts of shimmery cloth.

Kyrian crept down the hall, crouching low enough that the crate and cloth would hide him from any casual glance. Less than three hours into his first solo field mission and he’d thrown out all good sense and a simple plan that took advantage of his specialized training. His instructors would have had him flogged and thrown out of Intelligence for sheer stupidity. He had only basic stealth training and none of the equipment for it – no stealth suit, no silent grenades or poisoned knives, no darts, no specialized close-quarters weapons.

_I can do this._ He wouldn’t imagine Jheeg, or Keeper, or Instructor Senrit shouting at him. He wouldn’t consider the possibility of failure.

There were three men and two women in the room. All human. All armed. None aware of his presence.

The shuttle had been carrying a mix of military hardware and luxury goods. Someone’s half of a spice deal, most likely. The case he was after sat next to an open crate of grenades, apparently untouched. And in plain view of everyone in the room.

There was only one certain course of action: retreat to the hillside and carry out Jheeg’s plan. They would hear the guard go down, rush out of the building, and be picked off one by one. There really wasn’t another option.

The room was lit by two large field lamps – little more than globes on sticks. Kyrian considered the geometries. None of the thugs had their weapons drawn. Two of them were debating opening a bottle of Zeltron spiced wine and another had his hands full of a long rope of pearls.

A burly woman held a large green stone up to the light. “Only right we get some spoils.”

“I ain’t riskin’ it.” A man with cropped gray hair folded his arms and sat down on an unopened military crate. “Fa’athra’ll feed you all to his pets.”

“Coward.” The man with the rope of pearls fished in his pocket and pulled out a small knife. “You got to skim a little. Everybody does.”

“Best wine in the galaxy.” The woman held the bottle out to the man on the crate. “Might be our only chance to-”

Two shots plunged the room into darkness.

Kyrian dove for the case. He bounced off someone in the dark, rolled to his hands and knees, and grabbed the case. He retreated backward, slamming into the crate he’d hidden behind. His muffled yelp was lost amid the thieves’ shouts and swearing.

Kyrian fled down the hall, staying low in case any of them had flashlights. Or decided to risk shooting in the dark. He tripped over a chair in the back room, picked himself up, and raced out the door.

Straight into the guard who’d been out front.

Momentum was on Kyrian’s side. The man stumbled back, blaster pointing momentarily at nothing. Kyrian ducked, swinging the case at the other man’s gun hand. He missed. And kept running.

Blaster bolts pocked the swampy earth, sending up little gouts of flame. Kyrian dodged around the corner of the building and threw himself into the thick undergrowth of the hillside. He scrambled upward, slipping in the mud.

The flashes of blaster fire grew more wide and wild. He rolled over the top of the rise, slid down the other side, and sprinted into the tangled streets of Jiguuna.

\--

Half an hour later, he stumbled into Jheeg’s shop, dirty, bruised, and exhausted, but still clutching the case.


End file.
